Identifying A Black Swan Event
Based on the author's criteria:
- The event is a surprise (to the observer).
- The event has a major effect.
- After the first recorded instance of the event, it is rationalized by hindsight, as if it could have been expected; that is, the relevant data were available but unaccounted for in risk mitigation programs. The same is true for the personal perception by individuals.
An example Taleb uses to explain his theory is the events of September 11, 2001. 9/11 was a shock to many observers. Its ramifications continue to be felt in many ways: increased levels of government control; "preventive" strikes or wars by Western governments. The coordinated, successful attack on the World Trade Center and The Pentagon using commercial airliners was virtually unthinkable to many at the time. However, with the benefit of hindsight, it has come to be seen as a predictable incident in the context of the changes in terrorist tactics.
Read more about this topic: Black Swan Theory
Famous quotes containing the words identifying, black, swan and/or event:
“And the serial continues:
Pain, expiation, delight, more pain,
A frieze that lengthens continually, in the lucky way
Friezes do, and no plot is produced,
Nothing you could hang an identifying question on.”
—John Ashbery (b. 1927)
“It’s not like I was out there running and not knowing what’s going on in the country. I knew what was going on, but I felt this is not something that is going to bog me down and not let me participate. The only way I was going to make a difference for myself or any other black person is to say the hurdles were there and do what I had to do.”
—Wyomia Tyus (b. 1945)
“And of the swan in death these dreamers tell
of its last flight and how it falls, a plummet,
pierced by the freezing bullet
and how three feathers, loosened by the shot,
descend like snow upon it.”
—Patricia K. Page (b. 1916)
“There is nothing that I shudder at more than the idea of a separation of the Union. Should such an event ever happen, which I fervently pray God to avert, from that date I view our liberty gone.”
—Andrew Jackson (1767–1845)